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Few artists have become as identified with their state as Oklahoma's Charles Banks Wilson. Painter, printmaker, magazine and book illustrator, teacher, lecturer and historian, Wilson's work has been shown in more than 200 exhibitions in the U.S. and throughout the world.

The permanent collections of major museums and galleries contain his paintings and prints of Oklahoma life. These include New York's Metropolitan Museum of Art and Washington?s Library of Congress, Corcoran Gallery, and the Smithsonian.

Writers have said that Wilson's paintings breath the spirit of the Southwest. The Trapper's Bride, Wilson's work commissioned by John D. Rockefeller, Jr. in 1955 is considered among the finest portrayals of the far West's fur trade.

Wilson painted portraits of many well-known individuals, including U.S. House Speaker Carl Albert, Will Rogers, Sequoyah, U.S. Senator Robert Kerr, and Jim Thorpe. He is best known for portraying contemporary American Indian life, a passion of his for most of his career.

Honored by the U.S. State Department and the International Institute of Arts and Letters in Geneva, Switzerland, Wilson received the first Oklahoma Governor's Art Award in 1975. He is a member of the Oklahoma Hall of Fame and recipient of the Western Heritage award from the National Cowboy and Western Heritage Museum.

Wilson also created four murals totaling 110 feet in length for the Oklahoma state Capitol rotunda. The murals depict the state's discover, frontier trade, Indian immigration and settlement.

In 2001 Banks became the ninth Oklahoma Cultural Treasure.